The 10 Tenants of Positioning Strategy Explained

The last 100 years of marketing and advertising comprises three major eras:

1. The Copywriting Era or Poetry Era of Eugene Schwartz and Clyde Hopkins. The best copy won.
2. The Image Era of David Ogilvy. Images and emotions rather than words won.
3. The Positioning Era of the current age. Straightforward and clear language wins.

To be successful in today’s Positioning Era you must reject a lot of conventional marketing and advertising. Marketing and advertising fundamentals are essentially behavioral and behavioral psychology – that’s timeless. But the tactics and approaches to the marketplace must be suited to the current era, it must play by the rules of the game – and these do change.

Below are The 10 Tenants of Positioning Strategy Explained, or simplified. Stray from these 10 tenants and your business will be part of the 99% who fail within the first 5 years.

1. Positioning is thinking in reverse. Instead of starting with yourself, you start with the mind of the prospect.
2. What position do you want to own?
3. Don’t ever go head-to-head against a market leader. Go around the obstacle, not through it.
4. Reposition by comparison – hard numbers. Presenting facts by numbers goes around a competitor, not through them.
5. Prospects don’t buy, they choose.
6. Do you have enough money? It takes money to establish a position. It takes money to hold a position once you’ve established it. Marketing & advertising reach is important, after a positioning strategy is deemed solid.
7. One way around well-financed competitors is to reduce the geographic scope of your problem. Drill your customer avatar to a specific area.
8. Positioning is a concept that is cumulative and long-term. It takes advantage of advertisings long-range nature.
9. With rare exceptions, a company should never deviate from it’s basic and established positioning strategy. Only it’s tactics, those short-term maneuvers that are intended to implement a long-term strategy.
10. Owning a position in the mind is like owning a valuable piece of real estate.

Positioning: The Battle For Your Mind is a book written by Al Ries and Jack Trout. This book defined a new approach to communication, and may have defined the new era of marketing called “Positioning”. This is a book is as much about marketing as it is human psychology.